


to bleed / gold

by vaultbug



Category: The Dragon Prince (Cartoon)
Genre: Angst, Canon-Typical Violence, Character Study, Gen, season three spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-03
Updated: 2020-05-03
Packaged: 2021-03-02 05:26:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,140
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23979709
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vaultbug/pseuds/vaultbug
Summary: The sword slides in easily.
Relationships: Claudia & Soren (The Dragon Prince)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 28





	to bleed / gold

The sword slides in easily.

That’s the funny thing about it though, he thinks mutely as the tip rips in,  _ through _ . The action is so simple when it comes down to it. There’s little resistance, like he’s five again and carving up his first training dummy, training sword through cotton flesh. It must be because katolian steel is a fine metal. It’s durable. Dependable. Won’t shatter against a shield, won’t break if you treat it right. He’s cared for this blade as long as he’s been a Crownguard and he supposes that’s why the stroke is clean when it slides into Viren. The blade knows his intent, knows his stroke of the wrist. They’ve trained together for so long, after all. 

(A small mercy that is, having a sword that knows him. It makes skewering his father so much easier.)

His father gasps. That’s another funny thing, his gasp. All his life Soren has heard his father from seven steps back, a figurehead, a leader -- someone strong and colossal, someone  _ worth  _ following. No weakness came from those lips, and if they did, it was never in public or when Soren was within earshot. Yet. Against him, his father’s gasp is so soft, fragile; it lifts off the edges of the tongue as if his dad is afraid of letting it go, terrified that the noise will mark his end. The wind is almost as loud as it. He wishes it was, so he would not hear it so.

He rips his sword clean. Again, so plain a gesture. Soren marvels at how light the blade still feels in his hands. Are his hands trembling? He finds he doesn’t quite care yet, so caught up in how his father looks in the light. His robes (Father always liked white robes) are so clean but there’s a red line just off-centered in the middle of his chest that Soren’s left with steel. It spreads as he watches. Idly in the corners of his mind he realizes he has missed once again, intended for the center of his chest. Viren had taught him the centre. He would be angry, if he had been watching and not under the blade. One more disappointment for his father to take to the grave.

Though. Viren still hasn't said a word. No half-choked curses. No words of trickery. His father’s hands are shaking in fact, so unsteady they quake as they touch the line on his chest and then grip the fabric as if it will close the wound and he will be alright. Soren watches. Memorizes every detail, not by choice. Father always said,  _ to honour a combatant in death, you must look  _ and out of everything Viren has said, he feels like that's half a truth. (Or perhaps he's still worshipping his dad, can't make the connection between lying Viren and father Viren in his mind yet. He would not be surprised if that was the case.) He gazes through the man, feels every detail engraved into his mind and somehow he already knows he will relive this moment, again and again for the rest of his life. 

Viren moves his lips soundlessly. His father’s eyes roll up in his head and then he pitches backwards, last cry voiceless on his lips.

And there’s Claudia. His sister’s eyes are full of shock. Soren has seen the look on her face only a few times; once, when he fell down the steps of the courtyard and scraped up his knees, bloody hands on red concrete. Another time was not as violent, when he nudged her into a lake to teach her to swim, her look of shock twisting into outrage as she threw sand into his eyes. Both times it was not permanent. Now, the look scars into her face as if Soren had taken his sword and cut her down too. Her voice is but a growl when she speaks. “How  _ could  _ you,” she snarls and it’s an accusation.

He breathes out. He looks to his hands then, trembling -- they can’t hold the sword up any longer and it clangs to the ground. His legs follow suit next. His gaze falls back on his bleeding father, red stain in brown dirt. 

(Father is dead. You killed him.)

“I -- I had no choice,” he offers between them. It feels like an excuse. It feels like a lie. ( _ Always a choice. Like father, like son _ , his mind whispers.) 

When he looks back up at Claudia, she knows it’s a lie too.

* * *

Later, he sits at the edge of the mountain surrounded by the corpses of the war and breathes in, out the smell of ashen remains. Beside him two soldiers lay still, motionless in their eternal grapple -- one slumps over speared by a scythe, the other’s half twisted so unrecognizable under the hail of arrows through their chest. He avoids staring too long. The dead shouldn’t be burdened with looks. Best they be left alone in their silence.

The one outside he killed was not Viren. He knows that now. How foolish of him to think his father would have died without some final word. The three moths lay dead where his father’s illusion had fallen, father-like facade ruined by his sword. Another mercy granted by the gods.

His real father, the sly traitor, is dead now. Killed by a fall from the mountain, pushed by the elf Rayla who stands beside Callum, hands interlocked so tight they must be turning blue. They talk in small whispers behind him and he does not go join them. He doesn’t know what he’ll say. Perhaps a question. Did his father cry out for anyone as he fell? Was there any mention of him at all? He shouldn’t ask such things. If Viren did say some final words, best their legacy be forgotten.

(The blood had been so real, though. Illusions by Claudia always had been. He should’ve suspected it. Should’ve known.)

Footsteps come near. He closes his eyes, tries to ignore them but a light hand falls on his shoulder. The King (so young) clears his throat and says nothing.

He waits. King or not, Ezran has had little patience in the past. Eventually the child exhales. “I’m sorry about,” the child starts, then trails off. He’s only eleven, Soren thinks numbly. Eleven and almost killed by the hands of his (fake) father. “I’m sorry about your father.”

He does not say anything at first. The silence between them stretches on, uncomfortably taut. He fears if he speaks, his voice will crack in half. A Crownguard is dedicated to the health of the King, not the other way around. “I did what I had to do,” he says back, voice sticky. Even the second time, it still feels like a lie.

Ezran’s hand tightens. The kid only hums back. 

**Author's Note:**

> Sorry Soren, you've been through a lot.


End file.
